To learn more about Brianna Skriver and Friends of Brianna, go to www.friendsofbrianna.com. The site includes a link to the Friends of Brianna Facebook page.

Benefit to help Brianna

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More about Brianna

To learn more about Brianna Skriver and Friends of Brianna, go to www.friendsofbrianna.com. The site includes a link to the Friends of Brianna Facebook page.

Benefit to help Brianna

The Zumba benefit is scheduled for 6-10 p.m. Nov. 30 at the Newburgh Armory, 321 William St. in the City of Newburgh. Admission is $20 in advance (which can be paid via PayPal), $25 at the door, $10 for students and $8 for children. There also will be door prizes, a 50/50 drawing and raffles.

It began when she started falling a lot at age 5 and has progressed to where today she can't walk, talk or swallow.

A local benefit to help Brianna's mom, Tammy Skriver, pay medical bills is planned for Nov. 30 at the Newburgh Armory, featuring a night of Zumba instruction, raffles and more fun.

Tammy Skriver is a graduate of Cornwall High School and still has many friends in the area.

She says that up until age 5, her little girl enjoyed all the things other kids do: running, jumping, climbing, playing soccer. But then Tammy noticed a difference in the way her daughter ran and that she was falling down a lot.

While doctors have repeatedly rejected the idea, Tammy Skriver thinks Brianna's troubles might have begun when she received her immunization shots for kindergarten.

About the same time, she also was diagnosed as having attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and medication was prescribed for that.

Six months later, Brianna was lethargic, drooling, wetting herself, and having seizures. Her mom took her off the ADHD medicine, but she continued to get worse.

In the past five years, Brianna has been seen by some of the best doctors, including those at Duke and Johns Hopkins. She's undergone countless tests: MRIs, CAT scans and PET scans, spinal taps, muscle biopsies and a biopsy on her brain, among others.

Last year, she was one of 100 able to gain admission to the National Institutes of Health's undiagnosed diseases program. Doctors there believe a genetic mutation might be the cause of Brianna's suffering. They repeated all Brianna's previous tests except the brain biopsy.

"They're still doing genetic testing," Tammy Skriver said. "But that could take several years."

In the meantime, Tammy Skriver is hoping to try an alternative, intravenous treatment — not covered by their insurance — that seemed to work for a South African girl with symptoms similar to Brianna's.

But it costs $1,800 just for the medication for each set of 10 treatments, administered over two weeks. All told, it will cost "thousands of dollars," Tammy Skriver said.

She remains hopeful that one day a cure for her daughter will be found. But as a first step, she'd settle for putting a name on what's wrong with her.

As she recently wrote on the Friends of Brianna Facebook page that was set up to help raise funds and awareness, "All I want are answers. Not just for me but because Brianna deserves them."